Citizen groups in Kano have urged the government, and relevant stakeholders to ensure the timely implementation of the 2024 approved budget estimate.
The groups made the call during a validation session of the 2024 budget analysis held in Kano.
Presenting a paper titled Health Sector Citizens Analysis, Akibu Hamisu of the Kano budget working group pointed out that, the state government had set aside over seventy two billion naira representing over 16% of the total budget estimate.
He said out of the 273 projects designed by the health sector, 131 were identified as citizens, 37 projects were allocated to urban communities and 68 were captured under rural communities.
Sulaiman Ismail from Hasken Kano highlighted the citizens’ analysis of the health, environment and agricultural sectors, paying particular attention to how CSOs engaged the budget and identified gaps, developed advocacy briefs especially around the education sector being the top priority of the state government.
Others who presented papers include the OGP climate change lead Comrade Safiyanu Lawan Bichi and the secretary of the House Standing Committee on Higher Education, Kano State House of Assembly Muhammad Lawal.
In their goodwill messages, Khalid Mustapha from the Kano State Ministry of Planning and Budget (MoPB), described the session as apt.
Umma Mohammed and Mohammed Jibril from Lafiya commended the collaboration between Partnership to Engage Reform and Learn and the Kano State Ministry of Budget and Planning.
Earlier in his welcome address, the state partnership facilitator, PERL FCDO, Yunusa Hamza explained that the session was organized to present and collate citizens’ inputs for sustainable implementation as harvest and validate findings from the participating stakeholders to ensure precision and adaptability.
Radio Nigeria reports that the sessions ‘ tagged presentation and validation of the citizen’s analysis of the 2024 budget with stakeholders was supported by Partnership to Engage Reform and Learn (PERL).
KHADIJAH ALIYU
